


flounder with me

by peppermintzebra



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, I Tried, Meta, the whole thing is about trying, this is going to piss someone off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-08
Updated: 2014-02-08
Packaged: 2018-01-11 14:38:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1174257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peppermintzebra/pseuds/peppermintzebra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire exhaled roughly and sat up straight, bearing the earnest expression that Marius usually wore. “Have you noticed that Bossuet is black?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	flounder with me

            Combeferre sat down at one of the larger tables in back room of the Musain. He had arrived early to go over their plans for obtaining more ammunition and hoped to have good news to report to Enjolras when he arrived. Combeferre retrieved his notes and correspondence from their hiding place, tucked between the pages of a thick medical textbook. Before he could focus on them, however, a despondent Grantaire slumped into the seat across from him with his usual green bottle in hand.

            “You’re here early.”

            “You mean to say, I will be on time for once.” He takes a deep drink from the bottle, and through the dim lighting Combeferre could see that it was already mostly empty. His usually gregarious friend seemed troubled, so Combeferre elected to wait him out.

            They sit silently for a few moments, Grantaire rolling the bottle between his palms. Combeferre kept his head bent over his papers to give Grantaire some privacy to steep in his thoughts.

            Grantaire exhaled roughly and sat up straight, bearing the earnest expression that Marius usually wore. “Have you noticed that Bossuet is black?”

            Combeferre blinked. “Yes? What of it?”

            “As in, really black. His family is from the African continent.”

            Combeferre was beginning to worry. “ _Yes_ Grantaire. What are you getting at?”

            “I’m just saying, I don’t think they would know that if we didn’t explicitly state it.” At the word “they,” Grantaire gestured at the blank wall to the side of the table.

            “They probably assume because we’re Parisian students-“

            “Oh there were _definitely_ black people in Paris, even in the 1800s.”

            “I just meant that it would be unlikely for Bossuet to be both black and a student, due to the circumstances at the time. It’s an understandable assumption, even if we don’t like it or think it’s wrong.”

            Grantaire runs his hand over his face. “That’s the thing though; we’re not even in the 1800s!”

            Combeferre looks down. His papers are now a laptop. At his elbow is a frosted mason jar full of some sort of creamy, vibrantly orange beverage, which Combeferre distantly acknowledges as _Yep, that’s mine._ He’s aware of weight across the bridge of his nose and reaches up to resettle his thick, plastic frame glasses.

            Grantaire leans forward conspiratorially. “It’s so we don’t die.”

            “We weren’t going to die.”

            He’s dismissed with a casual wave of a hand. “Of course we were going to die. We’re still going to die, in the sense that all mortals do, but it probably won’t be by being riddled with bullets.” He looks thoughtful for a moment. “Okay, so _I_ still might die from getting shot, I seem to always live in pretty bad neighborhoods. This is all beside the point. What I wanted to talk about was how we could let everyone know that Bossuet and Cossette are black.”

            “Isn’t Cossette blonde?”

             “Beyoncé.”

            “Touché. Continue.”

            “We need to state it obviously, right, because people have been socialized to assume that the default is Caucasian. But how do you do this without getting annoyingly over-descriptive or too flowery about it?”

            “I’m not sure Grantaire, this is hardly my area of expertise. I suppose I would try to describe the person in plain terms and take care to not make any comparisons to food or drinks.”

            “That only tells me what I shouldn’t do!” Grantaire cried.

            Usually Combeferre tries to be calm and thoughtful but he truly does not know how else he can help Grantaire. “Perhaps you should ask Jehan?”

            “Prouvaire!” Grantaire hollers.

            “Yes?” Jehan looks up from his seat next to Combeferre. He had been furiously scribbling in his Moleskine notepad.”

            “Jehan, what do you look like?”

            Jehan sets down his pen and clasps his hands on the table before him. “Well, last week I had long, braided hair with fresh flowers woven in. I was a waifish thing, shorter than Courfeyrac and wore oversized pastel sweaters with mismatched prints. I got bored of that though, so this week I’m built like a brick shithouse, only half an inch shorter than Bahorel, and have a strong jaw and a morose disposition. I also think I do drugs now? In like an artsy way, of course.”

            Jehan tilts his head up and to the left. “She says that she doesn’t really know how to describe a character’s ethnicity, and hopes to God she’s not being offensive.” He listens some more. Grantaire patiently takes another swig from his green bo- his can of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Combeferre cautiously tastes his drink. It’s extremely sweet Thai iced tea.

            “She says I’m also Asian now. Think of what Godfrey Gao looked like in _The Mortal Instruments_ movie.” Jehan frowns at the ceiling. “That’s what you’re going with? That description was awful. No one is going to take your writing seriously if you’re just bluntly assigning celebrity faces to us _inside_ the story. Put that sort of thing in the author’s note, if you must. We’re going to have words, me and you. You _know_ how many people try out fics because the plot sounds promising, but then they back out faster than an Italian sports car when the writing is bad.”

            As he was saying all of this, Jehan had thrown open the nearest window and shoved the shutters aside. Combeferre and Grantaire watch his legs and feet disappear as he climbs the drain pipe up the side of the building.

Marius chooses this moment to wander over to their table. His brows are knit and he glances back nervously at Courfeyrac seated at another table. Courfeyrac is giving him two thumbs up.

            “Courfeyrac said that this is a valid question to ask, and I’m not sure if he’s just putting me on again, but why can’t we just let them imagine what we look like? Isn’t that one of the best parts of reading, to use your own imagination to envision the people and places? It also depends on the writer’s style, right? Sometimes writers prefer to describe the scene or the actions more than the characters.”

            “You’re joking, right?” Enjolras stood on the threshold into the back room. “It’s unavoidable that you’ll have to describe characters. Even by saying something is ‘indescribable’ you are describing it.”

            Grantaire is seized with sudden attentiveness, utterly arrested by the man’s beauty. Combeferre is impressed with his friend’s strong presence and how it suddenly commands the attention of the entire room. It’s not entirely clear what about Enjolras makes him beautiful, or how Enjolras has a strong presence, but his shadow is very imposing. It stretches along the wooden floors of the room, fifteen feet of rigid lines and sharp angles. The light from the other room is low, so Enjolras probably isn’t actually fifteen feet tall.

            Enjolras continues, “If there is going to be plot development, the characters are probably going to interact with strangers or their bodies are going to interact with the environment. You need to give the reader at least a little description to work off of in order to understand these interactions. You don’t have to wax poetic about rosy cheeks or the exquisite quality of the character’s teeth, but at least _some_ descriptors are needed.

            It’s important to properly represent different ethnicities, especially if the story takes place in contemporary western society. We’re socialized to find whiteness as the norm, so it’s not necessarily anyone’s fault if they immediately assume all the characters are white, but it’s important to take steps towards proper representation so that you’re not perpetuating inequality through inaction. If you think that’s it’s not necessary to make characters explicitly people of color, because the fight against racism is finished, then you’re either in denial or in a privileged position where you can just ignore inequality and how it’s hurting people because it’s not hurting _you._ ”

            Grantaire manages to avoid incurring Enjolras’s wrath, seeing as how he was still berating Marius, and pulls Combeferre aside. “Did you know that a lot of readers just scroll past Enjolras’s social justice spiels? It’s obvious when it’s coming up in a story, because it’s a huge block of text between only two quotation marks. Sometimes it’s followed by outraged italics when he doesn’t like how I react.” Grantaire finishes up his beer with audible gulps.

            “ _Grantaire, put that modern alcohol container down._ ”

            He nudges Combeferre in the side,“Like clockwork.”

            “Excuse me?” Enjolras turns to face him fully. It’s uncertain why but his expression is terrifying despite its inexplicable beauty.

            “I said, ‘Like clockwork.’ Unequal representation in media is going to continue until the end of time. You think that this one little story is going to affect anything? I mean, look at it, it’s not even tagged with a pairing. No one’s going to read it.

People are always going to assume whiteness is the default. It’s already programmed into our minds and regularly enforced in nearly every aspect of society. Some people of color might even prefer to see white people on T.V. and in movies. People watch movies and read books because they want to escape how horrible real life is. If the character in the story is also suffering the same problems then it’s not really an escape, is it? It’s easier to read and write about white characters who can just have adventures, so that’s what people will always do.”

            “That was a pretty depressing reply so I’m glad that people probably scroll past my spiel too. Let’s end on a joke! Enjolras, on a scale from one to America, how free are you tonight?”

            Enjolras exhales heavily through his nose. “Considering the abysmally small difference between either end of the range, my answer is ‘Not very.’”

            “Ah.”

**Author's Note:**

> Frick I gotta go, Jehan's almost up the roof.


End file.
